


Fall for You

by NancyDfan



Category: Nancy Drew - Carolyn Keene, Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys Super Mysteries - Franklin W. Dixon & Carolyn Keene
Genre: Alternate Universe - Guardian Angels, F/M, Guardian Angels, angel!joe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-17
Updated: 2019-01-17
Packaged: 2019-10-11 19:22:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17452805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NancyDfan/pseuds/NancyDfan
Summary: He’s been destined to protect her before she was formed, but somehow along the way he falls in love with her.





	Fall for You

**Author's Note:**

> Credit to hunting-hardy-brothers for the idea! I was just like, let me throw something together real quick. I haven’t written for them in forever and I hope it’s okay 😅
> 
> Not betad. Expect typos

Joe knew of her coming for thousands of years before his father created her. A special soul designed to save, to love, to protect, and it would be his job to protect her.

Assignments come and go in the meantime, and Joe watches dutifully over all of them. Some he grows close too, mourning and laughing as their lives spring forth and whither like flowers. Others are flashes of light, barely there before their lives are snuffed out. But he stays far enough away. A guardian angel to his human is all he can be.

And then Nancy is formed.

Joe watches with wonder and delight as the stardust takes shape as the beautiful, human child. He's seen it thousands of times, but there's something different. He sees extra light seeping through the tiny creature. He sees wonder and delight and power and creativity, and he knows, absolutely knows, she is different. When it's her time to be born, Joe almost cries as she leaves him.

He flies down and watches closely, closer than he's ever allowed himself to be with his human. Joe perches at her window watching her grow. She's full of spirit and determination, and he feels his soul sing as she dances in her room or creates a world of wonder. He's never been so happy.

Then her mother dies.

Joe has never felt so helpless as a guardian angel when they cart Nancy's mother out. He feels the pain, knows the hurt, and he slips into her room wrapping his wings around her hoping he can shelter her from some of it. He touches her forehead gently soothing the anguish in her soul and guiding her to sleep.

When's she's sixteen, Nancy's a spit fire of anger and rebellion. Her heart’s broken, and she's thirty miles outside of town when her tires hit black ice. She never sees it coming, and by the time her car careens into the frozen pond, Nancy has lost consciousness.

Joe swoops in. He claws through the water and the ice, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her to safety. His hands touch her wounds, and he breathes easily as her eyes flutter open. She can't see him, only stares ahead, but her lips open suddenly. "Thank you," she whispers, and he feels something shift in his soul.

There's a rule in heaven: you don't give up your wings for humans. You can; you're not damned to hell for it, but you're cut off for the rest of eternity as punishment. You suffer the pain. You age, you die. Often humans reject you as some crazed, obsessed stranger when you approach, and the person you gave up everything for turns you away. But all of this is of little consequence as Joe's feet lands on earth.

He's broken the rules; he's fallen love with Nancy, and heaven and hell can't keep him from her. Joe doesn't understand it necessarily. He's watched hundreds of humans live and die. What's so different about Nancy Drew? How did she claw into his soul and claim him as her own?

Joe's standing in the forest alone and away from the nearest human life. He made sure to protect the area lest a poor soul stumble into the fury of what he's about to do. This is permanent, he reminds himself. You can never go back. You'll never see your family again. Is she worth it?

And the simple answer is yes. She always has been, always will be.

Joe's hands wrap around his wings, and he pulls. He screams, closing his eyes as he feels them rip from his body. The air erupts, and the force of his transformation knocks down trees for miles.

Joe collapses on the ground. He feels tired, no exhausted. He aches throughout his body, but when he looks down, he eyes with puzzlement and delight at his human form. Joe crawls to his feet and stumbles away. He finds a creek and washes the blood from his body. By the time he makes his way from the forest, Joe's chilled to the bone and almost overwhelmed at all his new human senses.

He finds a local shelter that offers him some clothes and a warm bed for the night. Joe manages to cover his wounds before they can see them and report him to the local authorities. He stays a little while, helping out around the shelter and comforting the hurt souls inside. But Joe knows this isn't where he's destined to end.

It takes him six weeks before he makes it to River Heights. Nancy is at a local baseball game, and she's a picture of perfection standing up and cheering her team on loudly. She’s 22 now, and he’s amazed at how she’s grown, how differently she looks with his human eyes. He watches her for some time before he sees her blond friend, the one they call Bess, nudge her and whisper. Nancy turns to look at him, and he stops breathing. It's a thing; he thinks it's a thing anyway. Either way, it's now or never as she slips from her seat and walks down the stairs towards.

"Hi," she says quickly. "My friend noticed you. You look really familiar. Have we met before?"

Joe offers a smile. "Maybe we ran into each other in the past. I'm Joe by the way."

"Nancy," she giggles. "Maybe should have started with that." She eyes him slowly then jerks her hands to where she had been sitting. "I, I have an extra seat. My other friend couldn't make it. Would you like to join us?"

Joe grins and nods. "I'd love too."

"Great," she exclaims and as she guides him, the ache in his back is replaced by the pounding of the heart. She giggles and laughs, and it’s almost more than his soul can take. It’s all so new and overwhelming, and he has to slip away to remember to breathe at one point.

“You okay?” Nancy sneaks up behind him.

“Yeah, I, I’m not used to crowds,” Joe says truthfully. He’s never been around so many humans before.

Nancy smiles softly, and it could almost kill him. “Well, I’m happy to sit here with you for a while. Let’s get some nachos and just talk? What do you think?”

He agrees because of course he does. And they do talk, all through the night. Joe walks her home when they finally decide to part, and he knows he’s made the right decision when Nancy reaches up and places a soft kiss to his lips.


End file.
